La praposition
by Pappillon
Summary: Yves has a question for Diana. (Staring Yves as Yellow Diamond and Diana as White. Happy Pride Month!)


Some of the diamonds resembled strawberries more than gems. Lined up in an army of unimaginable colors, Yves took her time in looking at each of them. From left to the right, they started too large and too colorful, bands as heavy as the gems attached. As though having a contest to see who could oversaturate their hues, they grew darker and darker further along the line.

"Ma'am," the woman working at the counter said too loudly over generic background music. It was a familiar music box tune Yves couldn't put her finger on. "Would you like to see any of them?"

"Yes, but," she caught a garish red diamond with a tag of seven thousand dollars. "Do you have something less…" Yves paused, exchanging a good-natured stare with the saleswoman. "Flashy?"

"Oh, certainly," she walked to a different section of the cabinet, and Yves followed. "What style did you have in mind?"

"It's an engagement ring."

"Oh, are you picking it out for yourself?"

"No."

"You're…proposing to your husband?" The saleswoman maintained her friendly smile, though she watched Yves, like the occasional passerby glancing in from the window. Their eyes moved along her long, shapely arms, returning upward to trip over the curls of her pompadour.

If anyone had stopped to stare, Yves didn't turn away. She pinned the saleswoman in place by her crow's feet, and the silver hairs in her brows. "It's for my girlfriend," she said, "My classy, opera-singing girlfriend. She'll want something fancy, but nothing obnoxious. Perhaps something in silver. Something timeless, like her."

Mouth off-kilter, the saleswoman set it back to customer service. "I think you'll find these are quite timeless—" She removed the tray and put it out, sliding it closer to Yves.

In an instant, she found it—a silver-banded ring with three small, elegant diamonds perfectly in line. They shone with icy intensity, reflecting the colors seen in the flashier case.

At one thousand dollars, it attracted Yves' index finger. "She would want this one. I'll take it."

"Are you sure?"

"Absolutely," and Yves dug into her purse to pull out her thousand dollars plus tax. Her wallet slimmed upon paying.

Days later, the ring waited at the bottom of her purse as Diana combed her hair in the next room. Though she only hummed, her voice made its way into the salon, matching perfectly with the notes of an aria she had sung recently. Like the tune in the jewelry store, Yves could pin the corner of it down but couldn't recall its name. It wriggled too much, and by the time an answer drew closer to the tip of her tongue, Diana clacked her way out of the bathroom, striking a tiny pose.

"Liebling," she smiled, cheeks the gentlest shade of powder pink. "Why are you sitting that way? You look so tense."

Yves had coiled into Diana's armchair, gripping her purse where the box lay at the bottom. She checked perpetually that it was still there, to be certain it hadn't sprouted tiny legs and chewed a hole through the seams to escape.

"I was nervous you would never come out."

Diana clicked her tongue, rolling her grey-blue eyes. "Please. You should know that it's important to be looking nice, even for the park. Are you ready to go?"

"Always," Yves rose like a newborn gazelle on rickety legs, but linked arms with Diana. Together they walked to the car.

On a normal day out, Yves and Diana would collect any number of looks, but everyone stared that Sunday. Pedestrians paused momentarily to look into the old yellow car's windows, laser-focusing first on the tall black woman in her mid twenties, then with puzzlement upon finding the middle-aged, short white woman next to her, usually dressed to the teeth.

That day, Diana was wearing a sundress, fingers armed with only some of her mother's rings.

She had pointed them out once.

"This one she received from an admirer in the army—" she explained, pointing to a modest sapphire. "This pearl one she received from a banker, who worked in Munich. All she had to do was sing, and men threw jewels at her. Our house was always full of flowers and chocolate. That's why she died young," Diana said. "She lived so much."

"Why don't you wear any of her more colorful pieces?" Yves asked. "They would suit you."

"No," Diana shook her head, putting her hand out as though pushing away something. "I would feel like I was pretending to be her."

"Well, _I_ think you would look beautiful."

Diana had reached over to massage Yves' ear then, thumbprint circling the tiny faux diamond stuck through it. "You're always knowing what to say, Liebling. So romantic."

Their ride to the park took place over occasionally interrupted silence, like when Yves slammed on the brakes after spending too long looking at Diana. She had seemed to be asleep, sunglasses poised over her eyes.

"Oh, Liebling—" Their hands met. "Is everything okay?"

"Everything is fine, Schatzi. I just need to pay closer attention."

After a short drive through the busy streets, they arrived safely. Getting out of the car produced a violent drop in blood pressure, and walking to the grassy field, previously rehearsed words scrambled, as if having fallen out of Yves' ear.

"Liebling, are you tired? Usually I have to walk behind you, you're so fast." Diana's hair blew in the breeze. For a heart-stopping moment, she resembled a Greek goddess in her crème sundress. She turned, waiting for Yves to catch up, lifting her shades to set upon her brow. "You don't have to always carry your purse. Do you want to leave it?"

"No, Schatzi."

"You won't be uncomfortable?"

"Never," replied Yves, and they carried on to the grass, where Diana laid down the blanket.

The sky that day housed herds of clouds huddling together, shepherded along by a breeze. Around them, couples sat in the grass as well, chatting amongst one another, as the stray man or woman might pass, walking the dog. Oblivious children played a ball game in the distance. Their voices echoed in the occasional laugh or joyous scream.

Lying next to one another, holding hands, Yves caught the frequent puzzled looks, but didn't bother staring back. For the most part, she kept her attention on the clouds, passing as her heartbeat pulsed inside her throat. Her hand grew numb as Diana caressed its fingers, drawing out secretive beads of sweat along her brow.

"What's wrong with you?"

Yves turned to Diana.

"Huh?"

"I said, what's wrong with you?" A smirk played on Diana's red lips as she rolled onto her side to be closer to Yves. One of her rouged cheeks rested upon the shoulder of her honey yellow blouse, and the way a few strands a of her short silver hair spilled onto her face released Yves' heartbeat to the wild. Diana continued. "You're usually so talkative. You tell me about this and those things that come into your mind, but now you're quiet, and your hand—" she squeezed it. "Your skin has grown sweat, Liebling. I think that maybe you want to break up with me."

" _Break up with you?_ Diana, _no_."

"Then why don't you relax? I don't understand."

Yves placed her free hand upon Diana's head, weaving her fingers into her hair. She moved closer then, as Yves' heart counted away the seconds beneath her skin. It howled under her clothes, and to it, Diana asked softly, "Why won't you tell me?"

Yves took a breath and almost said, 'do you remember the time you got so angry, you swore at me in German? Even though you scared me, I felt so conflicted, because I love it when you talk to me in German. You speak it so sweetly.'

She almost mentioned the time Diana got drunk and she drove her home. As they held hands on the way, she proclaimed her love, slurring letters and mixing languages. How Yves helped her inside, and they cuddled the whole night.

She almost brought up the time they went to Munich together for Diana's mother's funeral, watching as they lowered her into the ground wearing a fraction of her jewelry collection. Or how that night, Yves held Diana as she cried in the hotel room, the gaudiest pieces waiting in a box on the nightstand.

She almost recounted the time that nearly everyone had forgotten about her birthday, but when she was gone during a long shoot, a certain German with a spare key had decorated her apartment in sunflowers.

She almost talked about all the times she had modeled in fashion shows and found Diana waiting for her in the front row, waving as Yves slayed—and how hard it was not to smile.

She almost told her how beautiful she looked at that moment, wide-eyed and waiting for the answer.

Instead, she said, "I want you to marry me," and took the ring from her purse, pressing it into her hand.

Diana clutched it and Yves, pulling at her blouse. " _Vhat?_ "

"Will you marry me? I just—" Yves flattened under Diana's blue-grey stare, with her lips parted, and the blush on her left cheek smeared slightly away.

"You want to marry me?" She smiled and teared up. "That's why you were so nervous?" Diana began to cry.

"Oh, Schatzi—"

Like they had in the countless hours of the early morning, they held one another. Diana, fully ruining her mascara, marked Yves' face with lipstick, everywhere, for everyone to see.

"Okay," Diana said, "I'll marry you."

Yves almost told her that even though two women couldn't marry yet, she meant this ring as a promise to wait until they could. She didn't say that her entire heart belonged to Diana, or that she would never want another woman for as long as she lived. She merely made out with her on their blanket, in spite of every eye in New York.


End file.
